Dearly Departing

Ray, Bruce, and David had travelled in that cramped area, sleeping and fighting on a couple of green foam mats that smelled of chemicals in a rumple of sleeping bags, luggage, and a big spare tires all spread out over a bed of metal and dust. Looking back now, Ray wondered how they had made it all the way into the mountains without tearing each other apart.
“So, what do you think of me taking psychology?”
“Huh?”
“Me going back to school. Is it a dumb idea?”
He thought of Dooley’s idea of returning to the Dominican to be with a woman he hardly knew. People always needed reassurance it seemed. “Of course not. You can do whatever you set your mind to. I’ve never doubted you.”
“The archeology thing didn’t work out so well.”
Ray sighed and watched the flat land slip by through the passenger window. “You were eighteen. Most kids have other things on their minds once they leave high school.”
“It wasn’t that long ago. I’m still young and irresponsible.”
“Welcome to adulthood. The fact you can admit to being irresponsible and doubting your capabilities is a good sign.”
“That’s one hell of a way to start a pep-talk.”
“It’s true. Why do you think so many kids build up a mountain of debt and quit university after the first year? It’s because they’re too young to fully understand what they want out of life. They should take those first two or three years away from home and just live, work those crappy jobs and see some of the world.”
And don’t listen to anything your parents tell you.
Ray had wanted Dawn to become an archeologist. He wanted her to live the life he wished he could have had. Those wishes had been forced on his daughter when she was less than ten years old, and the girl had clung stubbornly to the idea throughout high school. Ray should’ve been more like Caroline. He should’ve let Dawn figure out what she wanted to be on her own. To Ray, dropping out of university had been more his failure than his daughter’s. His life had been a series of failures and screwups. Dawn’s schooling. The marriage to Caroline.
His sister.
“It wasn’t your fault.”
Ray looked at her incredulously. “What?”
“I quit university. I know you think you pressured me into it, but no one had a gun to my head. I could’ve switched what I was taking and tried something else.”
“Oh.”
“What did you think I was talking about?”
Ray didn’t answer her. He watched the steady vista of featureless browns and greys pass by instead. An endless ocean of flat, cold land. In another month or two—when it was coated in a hard blanket of snow—he could wander out into it and surrender his life to the extreme temperatures. It would be even easier than trying to drown in the ocean. Just walk out there a mile or so where no one driving by can see, take off my clothes and lie down. Look up to the sky and watch the clouds drift overhead. It would be over soon enough. They see freezing to death is relatively painless once the brain starts to shut down.
He pushed the dark thoughts aside. “You said your mom sounded happy?”
“Yeah, believe it or not, she’s been getting along just fine since she left.” The words stung, but she wasn’t finished. “Mom’s not coming back, Dad. I know you still love her, and I know that somewhere deep down inside you still think the two of you can get back together, but it just isn’t going to happen. I hated her for it then, but I let it go. I let her go.”
“Don’t talk about your mother like that.”
“I’m not talking about her… I’m talking about you. Did you meet any women on your trip? Did you even try?” Silence. “Have you dated anyone in the last few years?”
“I don’t think this a conversation we should be having.”
“Well if you won’t talk to me, who then? Did your buddy Dooley try and set you up with anyone in the Dominican?”
A string of lame excuses came to Ray’s mind. It was too soon. He was too old. He hadn’t met the right woman. He was too scared. They were all true, but the simple fact that he was still in love with Caroline outweighed them all. Ray knew she would never come back, that she no longer loved him—perhaps she’d never really loved him at all. “I’m done with all that. No more dating, no more girlfriends.” He tried joking his way out of the conversation. “It’s too damn expensive looking after the one Girl-of-Mine. I don’t need a second female to worry about.”
“There’s still lots of time, and you’re not that bad looking for an old geezer.”
“Thanks a lot.”
Dawn laughed and turned the radio on. “Let’s find some travel tunes.”
She settled on some awful rap station that strained the car speakers with pounding bass. Ray shouted over it. “When it’s my turn to drive, we listen to something I like.”
Dawn shrugged, and they continued down the highway.
Tyler knew it was hopeless. He walked amongst the cluster of travelers waiting for their luggage on the slow-moving carousels, searching for Dawn, knowing full well the odds of spotting her were practically nil. They would’ve been through here hours ago. He didn’t know where her father had travelled from, what flight he would have been on, or when he would have arrived.
He’d been loitering around the airport for too long. He had missed her, simple as that. A few people were beginning to give him second and third looks—people that worked there. The last thing Tyler needed now was having some security guard question him. He knew he looked like shit. His mother would call the appearance dopey and dishevelled. Tyler didn’t need the attention. He